The Day America Fell in Love with the World Cup

Let me guess. A day after Cristiano Ronaldo’s last-minute wonder pass denied Team U.S.A. a guaranteed place in the last sixteen at the World Cup, you are still feeling a little bit deflated. It just wasn’t fair, was it?

All that hard work after handing Portugal the gift of an early lead. The U.S. team was playing, quite possibly, its best game ever. The midfielder Jermaine Jones scored a thumping equalizer from outside the penalty box, and, in the eighty-first minute, the center forward Clint Dempsey bundled a go-ahead goal over the line. Portugal was done, or so it appeared. Cristiano Ronaldo, recently voted the best player in the world, was nowhere to be seen, and Chris Wondolowski, who substituted for Dempsey late in the match, repeatedly ran the ball into the Portugal corner flag—a classic time-wasting maneuver. The five minutes of time added for injuries and stoppages were almost up. In the Arena Amazonia, in the sweltering city of Manaus, twenty-thousand-plus Americans had their eyes fixed on the referee, urging him to blow the final whistle. Then Michael Bradley, who had played a great game, lost the ball in midfield. It went out to Ronaldo on the right wing. He looked up and curled in a cross that eluded the U.S. defense, and—no, no, this couldn’t be happening!—his colleague Silvestre Varela, racing from the center circle, headed it into the net with the last touch of the game.

In the chichi French café where I had been watching the second half with my two young daughters, there were groans and howls of astonishment. Fifteen minutes earlier, when Dempsey scored, the joint had been rocking to chants of “U.S.A., U.S.A.” Now there was a dejected silence. I explained to my elder daughter, who earlier had colored in her own U.S. flag, that, no, Team U.S.A. hadn’t lost; and, no, it hadn’t been knocked out of the tournament. To the contrary, it had performed magnificently, and it still had a very good chance of qualifying for the final stages.

I didn’t bother explaining that the World Cup is like that: it builds you up and lets you down, warping your judgment. Now that America has finally embraced this quadrennial exercise in fanatical but largely peaceful nationalism, our kids and their friends will have plenty of chances to experience it for themselves: the highs, the lows, and the bits in between.

For that, surely, is the lasting message of Sunday’s game. Americans, like practically everybody else, have gone a little World Cup crazy. As a lifelong soccer nut, and a naturalized American citizen, I welcome this development—and readily admit that I didn’t see it coming. Like most U.S. soccer fans, I’ve been conditioned to think of the sport as a minority interest. Twenty years ago, when the World Cup was held in the United States, it attracted big crowds, and Team U.S.A. played well, progressing from the group stage before losing to Brazil, the eventual winner. But the mainstream media, and most of the population, treated the event as a curiosity rather than as something to get exercised about. Now, although the tournament is being held three thousand miles away, things are different.

Last week, a friend of mine was walking through the Charlotte airport when the terminal erupted into cheers. John Brooks, Jr., who grew up in Berlin as the son of a U.S. serviceman, had just scored Team U.S.A.’s winning goal against Ghana. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never seen the crowd in an airport cheer about anything, except, perhaps, the departure announcement for a long-delayed flight. (Admittedly, I wasn’t at O’Hare or L.A.X. on February 22, 1980, when the U.S. hockey team defeated the Soviet Union by four to three.)

It’s not just jocks and soccer moms who are into the tournament. On Saturday, after the mighty Germany drew level with Ghana in a thrilling game, I suggested on Twitter that it would be cool if Ghana could sneak another goal. A former White House official replied, “No, Why do you hate @USMNT? #USA” Of course, I don’t hate Team U.S.A. Now that England has gone out, I’m cheering for them to win the tournament. But the angry tweeter had a point. If Ghana had scored again and had gone on to win, it would have made it more difficult for the United States to progress. And, for the ardent fan, that’s all that counts.

To what are we to attribute the World Cup phenomenon’s overcoming of American exceptionalism? In the long run, it is clearly a product of big forces, such as globalization and the onward march of information technology. Not so long ago, Americans regarded soccer as a game to play rather than as a spectator sport. Now there are entire cable channels devoted to the English Premier League and other club competitions. But there’s more to this than technological determinism and other long words. This World Cup is turning out to be a wonderful one, full of thrilling games.

Despite all the pre-tournament worries about protests and unfinished stadiums, Brazil is fulfilling its potential as a great location for a soccer festival. After thirty-two games, we’ve seen a hundred and four goals, and just six ties. As far as the group stages go, it’s already the best World Cup yet. In this country, meanwhile, ESPN and its sister channel ABC are doing a great job of broadcasting the event and conveying the atmosphere. The commentary is sharp; the studio discussions, led by Mike Tirico, are lively; and there aren’t too many of the schmalzy, pre-recorded “human interest” spots that blight NBC’s coverage of the Olympics. Also key is that ESPN, rather than saving the games for a tape-delayed replay in prime time, is showing the games live. That makes a huge difference.

And, of course, there is the performance of Team U.S.A., which has exceeded expectations. Against Ghana, the American players defended stoutly and scored a couple of breakaway goals. In the Portugal match, the team was set up to follow the same utilitarian game plan, but the early conceded goal forced it to attack, and it played some excellent football. The Americans were fit, well organized, and determined—these qualities we expected. But they also showed guile and flair. For this game, at least, coach Jürgen Klinsmann’s goal of closing the gap with the world’s top teams—Portugal is supposed to be one—was achieved.

Now comes another big test: Germany. If the U.S. wins or ties Thursday’s game in Recife, Brazil’s fifth-largest city, it advances. If the U.S. loses against Germany, it will have to hope that Portugal ties its game against Ghana, or wins, but not by a huge margin. (Conceivably, the U.S. could also advance with a loss if Ghana wins, but the math is trickier.) As my colleague Nicholas Thompson tweeted, “We now hope Germany doesn’t crush us—and we’ll cautiously seek support from Portugal. Sort of like WWII.”

In any case, U.S. employers need to be alerted about a sudden drop in productivity that will occur at noon E.S.T. on Thursday, when the game kicks off. If your boss gives you a hard time for streaming the game, or for sneaking out to the nearest bar, tell him or her to get a life. It’s the World Cup, damn it, and, these days, we Americans play our part in it.